I would really like to see these references handwritten documents of the Salerno School.
They must be from before 1471, because that is the oldest surviving Antidotarium that is currently in the BL and that is also why those are interesting.

In the Leiden Antidotarium’s preface, Renzi and Daremberg were mentioned.
In the accompagnied reference list those two persons have the following references:

SALERNITAN MEDICAL SCHOOL . – The scientific studies on the Medical School of Salerno started with the Collectio Salernitana , by Salvatore De Renzi (mid-19th century) and developed in the second half of the XX C. They have not been able to ascertain much about the origins of the institution, above all for the lack of adequate documentation. Little is known about its structural organization (at least until the age of Frederick II) and its original milieu (secular, monastic or clerical) is not clear.

For the XII and XIII C, we have qualitatively and quantitatively more conspicuous data. Nevertheless, as noted by Kristeller, the studies have not always been able to accurately distinguish between medical practice, scientific literature and teaching (university and not). This has meant that with the term “Medical School of Salerno” one tends to indicate the whole complex of activities, even those not purely didactic (ie ‘scholastic’), which developed in Salerno in the Middle Ages.

[M: FIRST PHASE]

Overall, it is possible to say that in the X and XI C, certainly in Salerno there was already an excellent and prestigious medical class provided with a discrete bibliographic availability – think of the “immensa volumina librorum” consulted by the archbishop Girolamo according to the Historia inventionis ac translationis et miracula sanctae Trophimenae (in Acta sanctorum, Acta sanctorum julii, V, Antverpiae 1731, pp. 233-240). But it is very probable that no institutionalized form of teaching, let alone university, would work in the city. X and XI C. therefore represented, for Salerno, a ‘pre-school’ period, where “there was not to be a type of teaching different from what was given in other cities […] and that was connected in one way or another to ecclesiastical institutions, such as monasteries and cathedrals “(Vitolo, 2001, p.19). It is therefore to be believed that, in this period, not a single school flourished in the city, but a plurality of institutes where, alongside the arts of Trivium and Quadrivium, elements of medicine were taught, perhaps more intensely than elsewhere.” The original Salerno literature is the exact copy of the schola itself: a work with several addresses, unitary in its intentions, constituted by a collective, by a group of schools where it is difficult to recognize the individual masters, the archiatri and the students” (Oldoni, 1987, p.85). This explains the myth of the ‘four founders’ of the Salerno Medical School, which would have been – in the mists of time – a Jew, an Arab, a Greek and a Latin: they are not individuals, but cultural addresses, points of intersection of the the same school where the culture Hebrew, Arabic, Greek and Salerno contribute to the medical art. The medical School of Salerno is characterized as a fundamentally ‘open’ entity, with an interdisciplinary vocation, ready to admit and incorporate cultural traditions and the most disparate, even contradictory, addresses. Of this period is Garioponto [K: Gariopontus] (Guarimpoto?), Author of a ‘Liber Passionarius’ , a compilation of writings of Galen already known in the early Middle Ages, and of ‘Dinamidia’ (on the therapeutic use of herbs), which will represent one of the specializations of medicine Salerno.

It is from the XII C. that it is necessary to think, for Salerno, of the existence of some form of coordination, of a somewhat collegial organization of practice and teaching, with a curriculum of study based on a standard group of textbooks. It is conceivable that this type of basic coordination, structured on the model of Jewish yeshivah (academy) (there was a thriving Jewish colony in the city), has meant that Salerno came to represent without a doubt a center where medical science was an important part (in any case more important than elsewhere) of the common teaching.

A process of progressive settlement and the organization of medical practice and teaching in Salerno began to take shape towards the end of the XI C. This phase hinges on the development of literary production, which essentially takes the form of the translation of texts from Greek, Arabic and Hebrew. In the second half of the XI C. we find Giovanni Plateario senior (progenitor of a true dynasty of doctors, author of a ‘De aegritudinum curatione’ and a ‘Practica brevis’ ) and Cofone senior (‘De arte medendi’). A prominent figure is that of Alfano (1058-1085), archbishop of Salerno, author of three texts: ‘Premnon physicon seu stipes naturalium’ (Latin version of a treatise by Nemesio di Emesa ), ‘De pulsibus’ (only later summaries remain) and ‘De quatuor umoribus’; all his works favor a philosophical approach to medicine.

The most representative and emblematic character in this century is Constantine the African (d.1087), perhaps a converted Arab; Arrived in Salerno, from Tunis , in 1077, he later moved to Montecassino , where he remained until his death. [K: Constantino had strict relationships with Desiderio, abbey of Montecassino, and Alfano. We have no doubt that he taught medicine in Montecassino. But we have no proof he taught in Salerno]. His activity was basically that of translator: he thus endowed the Cassino and Salerno culture with a series of very remarkable texts: some already known, such as Galen (of which he translated the ‘Ars parva’ and ‘Microtegni’ ) and Hippocrates, but also of ‘modern’ Arab scientists, such as Alī Ibn al-Abbās al Maǧūsī (‘Liber Regius’), Ibn al-Ǧazzār [K: Al Dschaafar ‘Viaticus’] (‘Viaticum’), Abū Bakr Muḥammad Ibn Zakariyyā al-Rāzī (‘Continens’); he also translated three texts by Isaac Israeli (Isaac the Jew). The list of treatises attributed to him by the biographer of the Cassino monks, Pietro Diacono, is truly impressive, and it is not easy to distinguish the translations from the original drafts (‘Antidotarius’, ‘Chirurgia’, ‘De coitu’, ‘De experimentis’, ‘De gynecia’ , ‘De interioribus membris’ , ‘De medicamine oculorum’ , ‘De pulsibus’ , ‘De simplici medicamine’ , ‘De urine’ , ‘Diaeta ciborum’ , ‘Disputationes Platonis et Hippocratis in sententiis’ , ‘Glossae herbarum et specierum’ , ‘Liber duodecim graduum’ , ‘Liber febrium’ , ‘Megategni’ , ‘Microtegni’ , ‘Pantegni’ [K: translated from Haly Abbas], ‘Practica’, ‘Prognostica’ , ‘Tegni’). His contribution is decisive for the introduction of Arab science in Salerno (and Montecassino), an epochal passage for the definitive take-off of the Salerno medical school.

[K: in the XI and XII C Arabic science was infinitely superior to Western science, including the early Salerno school. The translation of Arabic works was a great addition to the scientific culture of the time]

In the second half of the XI C we also find Trotula (perhaps Trocta) de Ruggiero: midwife and physician, she writes a treatise on obstetrics and gynecology, ‘De mulieribus passionum ante et post partum’ , and one of cosmetics, ‘De ornatu mulierum’. Of particular importance is the fact that a woman, in addition to practicing – as is normal – the activity of midwife, is the author of theoretical treatises; this is an unequivocal sign of the great diffusion in Salerno, compared to other more established cultural realities, of medical knowledge (we know other names of medical women from Salerno: Abella, Costanza Calenda, Rebecca Guarna, Mercuriade). Appropriately Massimo Oldoni (1987) recalls a miniature depicting the Salerno Medical School (Bologna, Biblioteca Universitaria, ms.22197, XIV C., Containing the Canon of Avicenna): the life of Roberto, Duke of Normandy, hit during the first crusade by a poisoned arrow, is saved by his wife, Sibilla di Conversano, who sucks the poison from the wound with her mouth; the miniature portrays the duke who takes leave of the doctors of Salerno (including women?) to return home, while two nurses bury the poor Sibilla. And Orderico Vitale wrote (in Historia Ecclesiastica ) of the second wife of Roberto il Guiscardo, Sichelgaita. She hates her husband’s first bed son, Boemondo di Taranto , and plots together with the “psalternitani archiatri, inter quos enutrita fuerat” (physicians from Salerno, among which she was educated), to poison the stepson ( The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis , edited by M. Chibnall, Oxford 1970-1973).

Also other treatises where written in the second half of the XI C., such as the ‘Practica Petroncelli’ and the ‘Antidotarium Nicolai’ (a real official manual of the Salerno pharmacopoeia). These are texts in which medicine is seen as a predominantly practical, concrete art, made up of recipe books and pharmacology.

[M: SECOND PHASE]

[K: the XII C is without a doubt the highest point in the history of the Salerno School. Most of the medical literature related with Salerno was written in this century, including the famous Breslau / Wroklaw codex] [M: the ‘Compendium Salernitanum’ was discovered by Henschel. It dated to 1160 ca and contains 35 treaties; Das Breslauer Arneibuch. R(hedigeranus) 291 der Stadtbibliothek. Minta Collins mentions M.1302, Codex Salernitanus, containing the unillustrated ‘Circa Instans’; this ms was destroyed during WW2]
Very important, also because it was widespread at European level, is the so-called ‘Articella’ , a corpus of seven medical treatises formed in the Salerno area ( Ioannizio’s ‘Isagoge’ , ‘Aphorisms’ and ‘Prognostica’ , ‘De regimine acutorum’ by Hippocrate, Teofilo’s ‘De urinis’ , ‘De pulsibus’ by Filareto, the ‘Ars parva’ – or ‘Microtegni’ – by Galen): an anthology used in schools and universities between the XII and XIV C. by those who wished to become doctors, to control the humours of the body and to understand the reasons for their alteration. This text, mainly theoretical, served to balance the other treaties based on more practical aspects.

The work of Constantine the African, with its extraordinary contribution on the theoretical level, gives an epochal turn to the Salerno medicine: it becomes “scientia”. Piero Morpurgo (1990) identifies a real ‘break’ between these two phases (XI century, “Cassino” or “pre-Salerno” phase: practical character, XII century, “Avicenna” phase: theoretical-speculative character). De Renzi ( Collectio Salernitana , 1852-1859) lists numerous names of “modern” masters, whose homonymy often makes the identification of personalities and attribution of works difficult: Giovanni Afflacio (‘Liber aureus’ , ‘De febribus et urinis’ ). [K: it seems that the production of Constantine was not immediately fully used by the School, but only after a while. Giovanni Afflacio apparently had an important role in transmitting Constantine’s translations to the Salerno School. It is very likely that he was a student of Constantine in Montecassino].

[K: medicine historians often underline the practical, rather than theoretical, character of Salerno literature of the XII C, as well as its experimental activity and the influence of the Greek-Latin tradition. It really seem that, in Salerno works of the early XII C, there are less scholastic method, less philosophy, less astrology and magic than in the works of the late XII C or in typical Medieval works in general. …
Most of the works were written with a didactic goal. Some contain clear reference to the teaching of the time, which was becoming more and more wide and systematic. Nicolo, the author of the ‘Antidotarium’ says in his introduction that the work was written after request of some students of practical medicine.Maestro Salerno in the preface to his ‘Compendium’, addresses his students saying that he wrote that work for them. …
Various anatomy treaties document the practice of the anatomical demonstration in the classroom, based on the dissection of the bodies of animals. The author of one of these treaties remembers the anatomical demonstrations of his teacher Matteo Plateario. His teaching is also important because he was the author of a Commentary on ‘Antidotarium Nicolai’: this not only is the first commentary on this work but also the first example of a commentary written in Salerno. Wherever they appear, commentaries witness a teaching method based on reading and explaining authoritative texts. During the early XII C, the school began moving from collections of recipes and prescription to commentaries, i.e. from practical to theoretical instruction: this is the first sign of the School receiving the influence of “scholastica” or contributing to its birth.]

[M: other authors mentioned by De Renzi:] Giovanni Plateario (‘III: De simplici medicina’ ) and Matteo Plateario (‘De febribus’ ), Mauro Salernitano ( ‘De lepra’ , ‘De oculis’ , a commentary on Isagoge Ioannitii ), Cofone junior (‘Anatomia Porci’ ), Ursone ( ‘Regulae urinarum’ , ‘Glossatio in Microtegni’ ), and others coming from France or from England, and therefore very internationalized, in contacts and in culture. They introduce Aristotle into the foundation of medical knowledge, thus extending it beyond the usual Galen and Hippocrates. Comments to the Articella are written by Musandino, by his teacher Bartolomeo da Salerno, by Mauro and others. The Salernitani have frequent contacts with other important physicians with a theoretical approach: among these, Ermanno of Carinzia and Roberto of Chester, who base their works on Arabian medicine and the ‘accessus ad auctores’.

[K: The next step, in the second half of the XII C, was basing teaching not on earlier products of the School, but on classical works of Greek and Arabic medicine translated by Constantine. Bartolomeo wrote a commentary on Hyppocrates’ Aphorisms. Isaac’s work about diets was probably commented by Mattaeus Ferrarius, but possibly in the XIII C]

[K: the earliest known example of a Salerno commentary on a classical text is Mauro’s commentary on Hyppocrates’ Aphorisms (second half of the XII C). Mauro (d. 1214) certainly is one of the most important authors of the School. He is well known for the many treaties attributed to him and also for contemporary documents and for what Egidio of Corbeil (Gilles de Corbeil) wrote about him.
His role has been made clear by a XIII C. ms discovered by Sudhoff (BNF Lat 18499). The manuscript contains several commentaries by Mauro: on Hyppocrates’ Aphorisms, on ‘Isagoge’ by Johannitius, on ‘Prognostica’ by Hyppocrates, on the small treaty about urine by Teophilus, on ‘De Pulsis’ by Filareto, on ‘Tegni’ by Galen. These commentaries are also important because they are based on the same group of medical texts, translated by Constantine, that, in 1270 ca, appear as the core of the medical curriculum in Paris, Naples and Salerno: in the XV and XVI C these works were all printed together under the title ‘Articella’ (see above). This suggests that such curriculum was first established in Salerno, and hence transferred to Paris, rather than the other way round. This is consistent with the fact that Egidio of Corbeil (Gilles de Corbeil), who studied medicine in Salerno, was, at the end of the XII C, the first to teach medicine in Paris.]

This is where the ‘philosophizing’ of Salernitan medicine begins. Moreover, Bartolomeo da Salerno, together with Ursone, theorized the distinction between the “practicus” (for example the surgeon) and the “medicus”. The latter is also capable of the didactic dissemination of the discipline: “medicus est […] qui artem docet” ( Comment to the ‘Tegni’ , the text, unpublished, is quoted in Morpurgo, 1989, p.45); and in the same work Ursone sustains the importance of the preparatory study, for a student of medicine, of logic. The innovation and methodological change between the two phases of Salernitan medicine are therefore mainly identified in the intensification of the practice of commentary. Matteo Plateario is the first to comment a medical text (the ‘Antidotarium Nicolai’ ) according to the modern “lectio” university practicee. And, in Matteo’s footsteps, Bartolomeo, Mauro and Ursone also embarked on the commentary of classical works of Greek and Arabic medicine (the texts contained in ‘Articella’ ). The passage from “practica” to “theoria” implies a new way of relating to the world of written culture and to books; contacts with scholae and scriptoria are intensified . Even for medicine, a real culture of the book is established. The combination medicine-natural philosophy, moreover, is now also prevailing in other medical traditions (especially Montpellier), thanks to the circulation of masters and scholars within the Norman ‘ Commonwealth ‘ (Egidio of Corbeil, Adelardo of Bath, etc.).

[K: Ursone’s commentary to his own ‘Aforismi’ contains the first explicit reference to Aristotle in a work from Salerno. This work seems to hint to Ursone having a deep knowledge at least of Aristotle’s De Coelo’ and ‘Physica.’ Ursone and the Salerno school had an important role in the acquisition of works by Aristotle, a process that had a great impact on the further development of medieval science and philosophy.]

[K: in the XII C the interest for non strictly medical subjects increased. A student from Salerno wrote the first Latin translation of Ptolemy’s Almagest]

This passage in the conception of medicine from practice to theoretical doctrine, however, was opposed, for ideological and political reasons, by the Altavilla [Hauteville] sovereigns . The royal government under Roger II is opposed to the theoretical medicine of the Salernitans. The so-called ‘Compendiosus tractatus de philosophia et eius secretis’ (Vatican City, Vatican Apostolic Library, Ms. Barb. Lat. 283), dedicated to Ruggero’s chancellor, Robert of Selby, starts a harsh polemic against Ursone, who in the ‘Glosulae aphorismorum’ superbly defined the Salernitans “nos vero physicae rationis sectatores” (Creutz, 1936, p.110). And then, in the Swabian age, Gerardo da Cremona attacks the Salernitani and the hermeneutical path they have undertaken. The aversion of the Norman court towards the Salerno Medical School is explained, on a more general political level, with the tendency of Salerno to be the seat of forces hostile to the politics of the Crown (at the time of Ruggero II, in 1137, the city had sided with the anti-Norman league, under William I , Salerno is home to a noble revolt against the king).

[M: THIRD PHASE]

De Renzi believed the XII C to be characterized, as far as medicine is concerned, by the drafting of original works, of a Latin spirit; while the XIII C. by an ‘idolatry of the Arabs’, materializing in excessive speculation and in an extension of glossing works. In reality, the third phase of the Salerno medical school, which coincides with the Swabian dynasty, represents a period of relative decline for the Salerno institution – according to the most recent criticism. The first fifteen years of the XIII C witness a real “brain drain” from the kingdom , especially in the direction of Bologna and Padua. According to the testimony of Nicolò di Jamsilla, at the time of Federico “in regno Sicilie erant litterati pauci”, (Historia de rebus gestis Friderici II […], in RIS , VIII, 1726, p. 495). The theoretical and doctrinal activity, inspired to Avicenna, which had characterized the previous century , according to that phenomenon of reflux that had begun to manifest itself, already in the Ruggerian era, with the ‘Compendiosus tractatus’ , begins to decline. At the time of Frederick II, that tradition of commentaries, for example to the ‘Articella’ , and to ‘accessus ad auctores’, which had characterized the golden age of the Salerno medical school, grows slower. As already mentioned, the scientific policy of the Swabians continues that of the Altavilla, and goes in the direction of an agreement with the cultural and scientific policy of the Popes. The church was strongly opposed to the rationalistic excesses of Aristotelianism, of which an overly speculative and philosophical consideration of medicine was an integral part. Natural philosophy, in the Swabian age, aims to combine theology and science: then astrology becomes the “scientia scientiarum” , because, more than any other, it allows us to contemplate the wondrous order of creation.

We know some names of masters of the XIII century, even if it is difficult to distinguish accurately personalities, skills and characteristics. For example, it is difficult to identify the so-called “Arcimatteo” (by some identified with Chancellor Matteo d’Aiello), author of ‘Glose Iohannitii secundum Arcimatteum’ . The most famous is undoubtedly Pietro da Eboli, personal physician (and official poet) of Henry VI, author of ‘De balneis Puteolanis’ (1212), probably dedicated to Frederick II, which describes the medical qualities of thirty-five thermal baths in the Phlegraean Fields, between Naples and Baia. Then we remember maestro Gerardo (Butuzio?), perhaps ophthalmologist of Enrico ( ‘De agricultura’ , ‘De modo medendi’ , ‘Summa medendi’; moreover Pietro Ispano quotes some comments: ‘super Viaticum’ , ‘super Macrum’ , ‘in Dinamidiis’ ); Pietro Barliario, characterized by an obscure reputation as a magician, perhaps devoted to natural magic and alchemy (a legend tells of his repentance and of his becoming a monk in S. Benedetto di Salerno following the death of his nephews, killed by his potions while they were browsing in his study); Gualtiero Salernitano (‘De dosibus’ , ‘Practica medicinalis Gualterii Scholae Salernitanae’), specialist in the urological apparatus (urethra, bladder, etc.) and gastroenterology, maker of syrups and potions; Giovanni Castellomata, archiatrist of Queen Maria of Aragon (1213), then, since 1254, bishop of Policastro; Bernardo Guindazio, “medicus imperialis” of the Latin emperor of the East Roberto di Courtenay (1219-1228), who called him from Salerno to Constantinople; Giovanni da Procida (d. 1299), who signs himself as “domini imperatoris medicus” in the testament of Frederick II (1250) and who was perhaps also Manfred’s physician, writes ‘Utilissima practica medica’; Ettore of Procida, Antonio Solimene and Filippo Capograsso seem to be ascribed to the age of Frederick, even if it is probably false the legend that wants them destroyers of epigraphs explaining the different thermal and healing sources of Pozzuoli, for their envy as Salernitan physicians against the healing properties of Naples waters. The famous surgeon Bruno da Longobucco , Maestro Gervaso, Martino Dardano, Matteo di Dopnomusco, Pietro Marrone and Giovanni De Ruggero should also be mentioned. Nor should the schools, even in the Swabian age, be missing feminine elements: in a miniature of ms. 120 II of the Burgerbibliothek of Bern , the partially autographed single witness of the ‘Liber ad honorem Augusti’ by Pietro da Eboli, Riccardo di Acerra is portrayed while being cured by some nurses for a wound in battle.

[K: the famous poem ‘Regimen sanitatis’ or ‘Schola salernitana’ was considered for a long time as the largest document of the early Salerno school. After Sudhoff’s work, it is clear that there is no trace of this work before the half of the XIII C. Yet there is a nucleus of verses of whose base Arnaldo da Villanova, in the early XIV C, wrote a commentary, attributing those verses to the School of Salerno]

[K: ‘Tabulae Magistri Petri Maranchi’ published by De Renzi, might be the work of Pietro Marancius, who taught in Salerno in the second half of the XIII C]

Therefore the main epistemological phases of the Salerno Medical School are three. The first one, essentially of a practical-empirical nature; a second one, developed as a consequence of the wave of new translations from Greek and Arabic, which sees the Salerno masters address the theoretical and literary sides of medicine. The third phase, the Swabian one, constitutes a sort of stasis of this second trajectory and a partial regression towards the first phase.

In general, the Salerno Medical School bases its conception of medicine on a fundamental principle of mature medieval science (the “equalis complexio” of Roger Bacon ): the belief that any suffering of the body finds an explanation in a disharmony that has taken possession of body. The great attention that the Salernitani dedicate to the theory of the four humors is emblematic of this concept.

[M: ‘Circa Instans’ by Mattheus Platearius was of course important as the source of a later illustrated tradition starting with ms Egerton 747 (1300 ca) also know as ‘Tractatus de Herbis’]

Closely related to the mastery of “medicina simplicium” is the great tradition and experience of the Salernitani in the preparation of poisons and antidotes, attested, among other things, in famous episodes of medieval Latin literature. The battle with poisonous potions, told by Richero di Reims, between the bishop of Amiens, Deroldo, extremely expert in medicine, and a doctor from Salerno who was – in the story – defeated; and in the chronicle of Saba Malaspina it is a doctor from Salerno who, at the instigation of Manfredi, poisons (with a diamond powder enema) poor Corrado IV.

The first legal act of recognition of the operational and educational structures of Salerno is issued by Frederick II, in 1231, in Melfi . In the ‘Liber Augustalis’ , five norms of book III are dedicated to medicine (understood as a scholastic curriculum and as an exercise in the activity of physician): 44, 45, 46, 47 and 48 (see ‘Liber Constitutionum’). Taking up some provisions from the Assizes of Ariano (v.) by Roger II, Frederick gives great attention to the recruitment of professors of medicine, the order of studies, the professional discipline of physicians, surgeons and pharmacists, public hygiene and protection of the environment, so much so that Antonino De Stefano could speak of a “real health code” (1938, p.229). The centrality that the Salernitan Medical School assumes in this legislation is absolute, and it is therefore reasonable to assume that the Swabian availed itself of the collaboration of the masters of Salerno in the form of a commission of experts for the drafting of the law articles concerning medicine.

Article III, 47 of the Constitutions intervenes in a rigorous manner in the question of the recruitment of medical teachers (paragraph 2): “with this law we establish […] that nobody in the Kingdom can teach medicine or surgery except in Salerno, and that one cannot take the title of master if he has not been examined with diligence in the presence of Our officers and masters of the same discipline”. The typology of Frederick’s intervention is clear: medical education, in the Kingdom , is only possible in Salerno, and is regulated by state intervention. The committee that promotes medical professors is mixed: teachers and royal officers, which clearly confirms that teaching was state-regulated.

In addition to academic recruitment, Federico also intervenes on the order of studies. The constitution III, 46 sets by law a curriculum structured as follows: study of a three-year introductory course of logic and five years of medicine and surgery (lengthening the duration of studies with respect to other municipal statutes). This compulsory insertion of the study of logic (“logica modernorum”, that is fundamentally the science of language, the basis of every doctrinal elaboration and norm of formal correctness of the argumentation) is indicative of the acceptance, now also in legislation, of the epistemological conception of medicine in the XIII C.: it has officially become a “scientia”, a “fifth art” of the Quadrivio, to learn which requires mastery of preparatory disciplines. At the same time, Federico shows that he also takes into account the operational implications of medical practice, of which he himself was – as mentioned – a supporter, as opposed to the “avicennalisms” of the Salerno medical school: “during the aforementioned period [the five-year term of medicine], the future doctor also learns surgery, which is part of medicine […] Within this five-year period, teachers teach in schools both the theory and the practice of medicine on the authentic texts of Hippocrates and Galen”.

Constitutions III, 45 and III, 46 regulate access to the medical profession. The candidate, after eight years of theoretical studies, must practice for a whole year under the guidance of an expert doctor (III, 46.11). And after the public approval by the masters of Salerno, you can not practice the profession if you are not first be presented “with letters from teachers and Our officials attesting loyalty and adequate preparation, to Our presence […] and will not have obtained from us […] the license to practice medicine “. In Federico’s idea, therefore, it is the political-administrative power, and not the university (the masters are only a technical commission in the formulation of the norm), to officially confer the status of doctor. Diplomas for the issue of authorization to practice the profession, in fact, are conferred by the king. The teachers are entitled to confer the title of master in turn, but it is necessary that the examination takes place in the presence of a royal officer (III, 47). Teachers carry out didactic, non-professional, recruitment. Even the profession of surgeon is regulated by the Constitutions. Paragraph 13 of III, 46 prescribes: “no surgeon is admitted to the practice if he does not present letters from masters teaching at the medical school, certifying that he, at least for one year, studied that branch of medicine that confers the surgical preparation and above all that he has learned the anatomy of human bodies in school and is perfectly instructed in this branch of medicine.

The physicists of Salerno are also responsible for strict controls on pharmacists, whose work requires their prior authorization (III, 47.1: “[…] electives, syrups and other medicines […] we also want these preparations to be authorized by the masters of physics of Salerno “).

It was the rigid regulation in the field of university politics that prompted David Abulafia (1993, p.222) to accuse Federico of having caused the decline of the Salerno medical school. But this interpretation is to be corrected, if not to be rejected tout court. Giovanni Vitolo’s interpretations are more documented, according to which the Swabian, with these interventions, would have represented a “valoriser of local energies” (2001, p.220). Also, Ortensio Zecchino glimpsed in Federician legislation, in a time of the “exclusive domain of private law” as it is the medieval one, “an indisputable charge of innovative planning” (2002, p.71).

Federico intervenes and regulates in a precise and rigorous manner both the structure of the studies, the conferment of the title, and access to the profession (which he reserves to himself). The Swabian is so authoritarian, as the Altavilla had been (apart from the episode reported above) little interested in directing and regulating the teaching addresses of the Salerno Medical School. Medicine, unlike the other disciplines of the Quadrivium (whose teaching does not find space in the collection of Federician laws, where the University of Naples is not even mentioned), has a very significant social impact, and the legislator Federico intervenes directly (III, 45: “When we take measures relating to public health, we are concerned with a problem of particular general interest, considering therefore the great expenditure and the irrecoverable damage that could result due to the doctors’ lack of expertise […]”). The consideration of this enormous social importance of the figure and of the role of the doctor leads the Swabian to command that “in the future, no aspirant for the title of doctor dares to exercise or otherwise cure if, having first been approved in public session by the masters of Salerno, he does not present himself – with letters from masters and our officials attesting loyalty and adequate preparation – to our presence […] and will not have obtained […] the license to practice medicine from us. The penalty of the seizure of property and a year in prison awaits those who will dare to exercise against this law issued by Our Serenity “.

Precisely to the definitive decline of the Swabian parable in particular, and Ghibelline in general, that is, in the late XIII century, the doctor of Boniface VIII, Arnaldo da Villanova, gathers the principles of the Salerno Medical School in the 3520 verses of ‘Flos medicinae scholae Salerni’ (of which there was a first draft in only sixty-four verses) and leaves almost a sort of testament of that great tradition , even if, during the following centuries, the Salerno Medical School will continue to exist, however, strengthening and rationalizing (for example under Charles I of Anjou) also from a juridical point of view.

Based on the above post, these seem to be the Salerno works that have a most obvious relation with the Voynich ms:

“Circa Instans” (aka “Tractatus de Herbis” aka “Liber de simplici medicina”), XII C, Salerno, by Mattheus Platearius (several digital copies available at the Wellcome Library). This treaty about plants was likely originally not illustrated. The earliest illustrated copy is BL Egerton 747 (1300). The text of BNF Lat 6823, 1300-1350, Naples?, Manfredus de Monte Imperiali is an expanded version of the “Circa Instans”; this ms contains the oak and ivy picture that Ellie, Rene and others paralleled with VMS f35v. Both manuscripts contain several other texts, among which both include a copy of Antidotarium Nicolai (see below).
These two manuscripts are strictly: the illustrations do not contain the zoomorphic and anthropomorphic elements that appear in the VMS and Italian popular herbals dating to 1400 ca. But the “Tractatus de Herbis” also merged with that popular tradition, e.g. in the several ms that contain both the “alchemical herbal” and plants from the Tractatus de Herbis (e.g. BNF Lat 17844 and 17848).

“De Balneis Puteolanis”, 1200 ca, Petrus de Eboli. It is far from sure that this poem is related with the Salerno school (Kristeller doesn’t mention Petrus de Eboli). The illustrations of the poem are strictly scientific, with no magical references; as far as I know, this is true for the text also. Illustrated manuscripts of this work have been paralleled (by Toresella, Rene and others) with the bathing scenes in VMS Quire 13.

“Trotula” (1150 ca) was a female physician and she wrote about women’s medicine and childbirth. According to some, she could have been the mother of Mattheus Platearius. I haven’t searched for specific reference to her in Voynich studies.

“Antidotarium Nicolai” (1100 ca). Koen has posted on the Voynich.Ninja forum a page of BAV Lat 1291. The page is part of a commentary on “Antidotarium Nicolai” and features containers and parts of plants comparable with the “recipe” section of the VMS. The BAV ms is date 1425: much later than the original “Antidotarium” and close in time with the VMS.
BAV ms (f1r) incipit: “Secundum quod vult Avicenna in primo libro practica dividitur in conservativam sanitatis et curativam egritudinum”. At the bottom of the first column: “Medicine composite sunt diverse que determinantur in anthidotario Rasi[?] et Avicenne et [?] et in anthidotario Nicolai de quo ad presens est intentio”.
A copy of the original “Antidotarium” is included in Egerton 747 (f112r), incipit: “Ego Nicholaus rogatus ad quibusdam studere volentibus in pratica medicina studere volentibus ut eos recto ordine modum dispensandi et ficiendi que docerem et certam esi traderem doctrinam”.
Another copy appears in BNF 6823 (f185r), incipit “Ego Nicolaus rogatus a quibusdam in pratica medica studere volentibus ut eos recto ordine modum dispensandi et ficiendum docerem et certum eis traderem doctrinam”.
The text and layout of the BL and BNF ms are extremely close. The BAV ms clearly is quite different, but the layout seems somehow comparable.

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Thanks marco! That is much to read. I will also have to add new information.

I was already working on full summary on the Antidotaria that have been found, I am not sure if that will be publicly published, cause I want to try making a comparison between the integral listed antidotes.

On the Trotula I already made a separate forum topic entry, because that has to be deepened som more.

The Circa Instans is new to me, there must definitely be made a new topic entry on that as well in the future!

Hi Agricola, I am sure you are familiar with Circa Instans, possibly under its other names. We discussed this herbal tradition several times on the Ninja forum: it really is the most important text for late-medieval herbals. I guess you have gone through Egerton 747 and BNF Lat 6823 several times. The ‘alchemical herbal’ was possibly more widespread in Italy, but its scientific value is quite limited, while the Circa Instans / De Herbis widely circulated in Europe (in France, in particular).

I certainly had never noticed before that the Antidotarium is included in both Egerton 747 and Lat 6823. This is very interesting!

In general, what seems to me to hint to a non-conformity of the VMS with the Salerno School is the frequent use of what appear to be popular, magical elements, maybe also a more complex, literate, esoteric thought (something like alchemy, in Quire 13, or a complex astrological system, in the zodiac wheels).

I have now a bit too much irons in the fire,for one I did not yet study your large text above, and fortunately soon I will be getting some free days to do some work on this: I will translate and post other information on the Salerno school based on the Dutch preface.

Still, yet there is no single handwritten document found as mentioned in my first post, so still there is more work to do there…

These two Vatican links are very interesting: the writing shows some very interesting paleographical features from our perspective.
I whish I could tell you exactly what I am looking for, but I don’t exactly know.

The only thing which is sure to me, that a biblio description is often false, inaccurate, wrong, and sometimes even the summaries of books are false.
So I want to see these handwritten documents myself, that way we can validate, learn, observe and discover things.

Have a look at this 1v on Pal.lat.1089 text, see below (two versions.. of that page) which I quickly made.

I am sorry I do not have more specific time for this;have to look into it more. You are way too fast for me marco !

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I guess I will now stop for a while. I think we had a good start on the subject and we do have some stuff to study. As a last thing, I attach the bibliography at the end of Kristeller’s “Studi sulla Scuola medica salernitana” (1986). I guess that the “TK …” numbers refer to Thorndike’s collection of “incipit”. Kristeller is mostly focused on commentaries to the ‘Articella’, so we don’t have a generic “Salerno” bibliography yet.

Some important manuscripts stand out:

* Breslau / Wroklaw M.1302, Codex Salernitanus – now lost
* BNF Lat 18499 (early Salerno works mostly by Maurus)
* Chartres 171 – several commentaries (also lost?)
* Oxford, Digby 108, Bodleian library (XII Century) – several commentaries
While early manuscripts are the most interesting for the study of the Salerno School (which declined after the XIII Century), we are just as much interested in later, 1400 ca, manuscripts. I think the search for those will be mostly up to us.

Kristeller notes that the attribution to Petrus Hispanus (who was pope as John XXI) cannot be correct. It is excluded by the fact that the text (only attributed to one “Petrus”) appears in Winchester College ms 24, 1200 ca, written before Petrus Hispanus was born.
Kristeller believes that the author is Petrus Musandinus (“Musandino”, in the article above), one of the students of Bartholeus of Salerno. When the BNF ms was written (XIV Century) Hispanus was famous as a theorist of medicine, while Musandinus was completely forgotten outside Italy. I am not sure if Kristeller’s observation applies to the whole collection or only to the last treaty.

Now I really stop.

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Nederland National Bibliotek ms KB 73 J 6 is believed to have been written under the direct supervision of Constantine the African. It appears to be one of the earliest surviving documents of the Salerno School.https://www.kb.nl/themas/middeleeuwen/liber-pantegni

(Small typo in the beginning: second half of the XX C. –> must be X century of course)

>>..Of this period is Garioponto [K: Gariopontus] (Guarimpoto?), Author of a ‘Liber Passionarius’ , a compilation of writings of Galen already known in the early Middle Ages, and of ‘Dinamidia’ (on the therapeutic use of herbs), which will represent one of the specializations of medicine Salerno.

dynamidia f (genitive dynamidiae); first declension
(Medieval Latin, medicine) The virtue of medication or of treatment.
Ultimately from Ancient Greek δῠ́νᾰμῐς (dúnamis, “power, might; medicine, action of medicines”), though the further derivation is unclear.

Appaerantly written in XII-XII cent and now in Biblioteca Angelica, one of the oldest European libraries (1604). Coincidently this library also holds a “De Balneis Puteolanis” but they hold some 120.000 codeci.

“———–
(c) Post-translation period. The injection of Arabic
texts into Western medicine fostered the writing of new
herbals such as the Regime of health (tenth/eleventh
century), the Dynamidios perhaps of Gariopontus (late
eleventh century), the herbal of Platearius commonly
identified by its first words as Circa instans (twelfth
century), the Salernitan secrets, and the early-fourteenth
century Book of herbs, with its French translation, the
Livre des simples médecines. As the latter suggests,
versions in the vernacular proliferated from then onward
(even though they were not a novelty of that time), in
Romance, Anglo-Saxon, and German languages.

The illustrations of a copy of the Liber de herbis, the early
fourteenth-century manuscript Egerton 747 now
conserved at the British Library (London), have a realisticcharacter that induced historians of art to think that theywere made from nature directly, rather than reproducingprevious models.

During the post-translation period, new translations of
Greek works were made by such scholars as *Burgundio
of Pisa, *Pietro d’Abano, and *Niccolò da Reggio.
Characteristically, they included Galen’s treatise On the
mixtures and properties of simple medicines and tried to
reintroduce Galen’s herbalism, which was abandoned
during the early Byzantine period. In Pietro d’Abano’s
pharmacological work, both Dioscorides’ and Galen’s
texts are associated.
“———–

The book is “intended as guidance for illustrators in medieval herbals”. Wauw. “The work M873 (477 items) has much closer affinities with Le Grant Herbier (474 items) than it does with Circa Instans (only 273 items).”